


bloom

by eichart



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Jealousy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-01
Updated: 2019-07-01
Packaged: 2020-05-31 16:29:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19429777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eichart/pseuds/eichart
Summary: Ras doesn’t mean to keep buying plants for each and every one of his teammates, but he does, creating little explosions of green and orange and purple around the apartment. It’s his nature to look after them, to know when something’s wrong, so he will.This team: he loves them.This city: it’s special.





	bloom

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [alcoholandregret](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alcoholandregret/pseuds/alcoholandregret) in the [PuckingRare2019](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/PuckingRare2019) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> magical realism au! it doesn't matter how big a role the magic plays in it, but it has something to do with nature/trees/flowers/etc.
> 
> \--
> 
> I absolutely love magical realism so I knew I had to claim this one. Hope you enjoy!

Ras isn’t allowed to bring his plants with him to Buffalo, so the day before he leaves, he carefully removes them from their planters and roots them in the backyard garden. He leaves the pots too with their names in neat script painted in Ella’s hand on his windowsill; they’re too heavy to pack and he doesn’t want to risk them getting broken on the flight over.

Still, he gives them a bit of a forlorn glance back when it’s time to leave; they’ve been a part of him for so long now that this, more than anything else, feels like he’s leaving a piece of him behind. But Ras knows the road to achieving dreams is paved with new chapters and self-sacrifice.

So for the last time for many many months, he closes his bedroom door with a definite  _ click _ .

\--

It’s an absolute whirlwind when he arrives in Buffalo a week or so before training camp, but the hecticness is almost familiar now, no different than the excitement around development camp ( though when he focuses, it’s a different kind of energy as well: the air buzzing with anticipation, promise, eagerness to get started, the season so tantalizingly close ).

Ella gives him a present before she leaves, leaving them in a neat row on his kitchen counter. It takes her whole afternoons and then some, carefully painting and painting and painting. When she goes, Ras has a new set of ceramic pots decorated with different scenes from home in lieu of names: different snapshots of memory for each of them.

He picks one up that depicts their home –silhouettes laughing in the sunlight—and smiles.

His mother takes him to buy new plants before she too finally leaves. Ras knows more by heart than head which ones to buy, guided by some sixth sense in the nursery: daylilies for her, daffodils for his father, ivy for Felix, and violets for Ella. He hesitates in the checkout line, gaze caught by blossoming blue morning glories before he reaches out and grabs them --- morning glories for the sharp shooting forward who’d been with him in Frölunda and now is here with him in Buffalo, even if only for a short while.

Victor Olofsson may not be family, but it’s hard to forget the first person you ever  _ loved _ .

\--

Training camp and pre-season pass in a blur of passes and goals and meaningless games. Still, it’s nice to be finally playing hockey again. Limbo before the beginning of the season ends, bittersweet.

Victor gets sent down to Rochester, taking calm and familiarity with him, and Ras misses.

Casey moves into the apartment, bringing dry humor and endless smiles, and Ras misses a little less.

\--

The season charges on and Ras fills their apartment with more plants: mint for Jack and Sam ( because he’s curious ), dusty sage for Tage ( more for humor than anything ), and yellow tulips for Casey ( he knows why they called out for him at Home Depot but he doesn’t want to dwell on it ).

He doesn’t have his sister’s artistic skills so their pots are much more plain, just splashes of memorable color, but no less loved.

Casey pokes at the pot of tulips (  _ his _ pot of tulips even if he doesn’t realize ) on the counter one day, “You really like plants, huh.”

Ras pauses where he’s mixing fertilizer with water. Shrugs.

\--

Jack and Sam’s mint plants start creeping and reseeding in their pots next to each other until Ras has such a tangle of mint on the windowsill that he can’t pull the pots apart. He finally leaves them be ( he got his answer weeks ago ), but does start clipping leaves, crushing them, and putting them in his water. He doesn’t think they’ll mind.

Casey’s tulips don’t flourish but do well enough and Ras supposes that’s an accurate representation of his season thus far. Still, not long after that he finds himself complimenting him, getting closer, not for the tulips, but for Casey.

Midway through November the morning glories start wilting, so he tracks Victor’s progress in Rochester a bit more closely, reads between the lines of their texts. And one morning when he finds dead petals dropped on the counter, he picks up the phone and calls.

It’s never really been about the  _ plants _ .

\--

He doesn’t mean to keep buying plants for each and every one of his teammates, but he does, creating little explosions of green and orange and purple around the apartment. It’s his nature to look after them, to know when something’s wrong, so he will.

This team: he loves them.

This city: it’s special.

He hadn’t exactly been lying at the draft when he had said he was pleased to come to Buffalo. It’s true he would’ve loved any team he went to ( he had to ), but he’s glad it’s this little snowy city.

_ “They already love you,” _ Victor had said at development camp, arms wrapped tight around him, feeling something like home.

He’s lucky, he supposes: all he ever had to do was love back a city that already loved him; not everyone is that lucky.

\--

Casey keeps questioning their apartment’s apparent new role as a greenhouse multiple times, an easy smile on his lips but a serious glint in his eyes. Ras brushes him off every time.

“They’re good for fresh air.”

Casey would probably laugh if he knew the real reason.

\--

He’s never seen plants flourish as the team’s do in November.

It’s understandable why. The winning is intoxicating; he feels invincible --- the whole team does as they pull of daring come-behind wins, scratch out of OT with two points in hand, find the back of the net in shootouts.

He finds Casey too easily after those wins, cellies and  _ I-can’t-believe-it  _ hugs at center ice. The arena roars in their ears, shakes the building to its foundations. Casey laughs with elation painted so beautifully on his face, and to Ras, this feels like everything he’s ever imagined.

But November ends as all months must.

\--

Everything seems to go sour all at once.

The team struggles to score, to defend, to win. The locker room turns dark despite Jack Eichel’s best efforts.

The plants begin to die.

No matter how much he wants, it feel like there’s nothing Ras can do but water them, put them in a sunny patch of floor, offer words of comfort, and watch helplessly as they grow sickly and the team loses and loses and loses.

He finds Casey too easily after those losses too; only this time to forget.

\--

He and Casey get very good at watching romantic movies. It’s something about the turn the season’s taken with the flip of a calendar year. There’s something about sitting down with freshly popped albeit slightly bland popcorn to watch something that you know will end in happily ever after.

He’ll fall asleep mid-movies sometimes, wake up having fallen against Casey’s shoulder with a stiff neck but more comfortable then he’s ever felt this side of the Atlantic.

Victor’s the one who does hope, but maybe Casey does something of his own.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he says quietly.

“Yeah ---” says Casey after a slight hesitation, sounding a bit unsteady. “Me too, Ras.”

Ras smiles and settles back against Casey’s side. It’s not quite home, but it feels like something new.

\--

Bye week is a little snow globe of stopped time: like hitting pause and living things out where for a moment, it’s perfect.

There are times when Casey looks golden in the sunlight on the beach and Ras just wants to soak all this in before it disappears: the water, the calmness, the way the waves glitter and Casey joking about them getting kids menus at the restaurant. It’s just the two of them, temporarily relieved of the weight of a failing franchise.

Ras gets a terrible sunburn on the third day. Casey laughs before bringing him the aloe vera and helping him with the places he can’t reach.

When they get back to Buffalo, Casey’s tulips have sprouted three new flowers, looking healthier than they have all season despite not being watered for nearly a week.

\--

They get officially eliminated from playoffs on March twenty-third.

It’s really been a long time coming now, ever since the only streaks they’ve been able to put together are losing ones, but the finality of it all still stings. The dressing room is deafeningly quiet after the loss.

Back at the apartment, Jack’s mint in particular seems to struggle, and Ras can’t even imagine. They’re saying elimination only came five days after the complete failure of last year: something that seemed like an impossibility in November when they’d topped the stands – been invincible.

But nothing is ever impossible, only unlikely, and for years now Buffalo has hardly been a lucky place.

He watches Casey approach Jack, wrap him in a hug and mutter something in his ear. Jack smiles a bit sadly in response and leaves with Sam.

That night him and Casey buy multiple packages of non-diet approved chocolate chip cookies at Wegmans and binge romantic movies late into the night.

\--

He’s elated when Victor finally gets called up despite it being the end of the season – too late to really make a difference, but that matters very little to him. This joy, it’s selfish: he’s missed having him so close.

Ras can tell almost the moment Victor walks into the dressing room by the eerie sense of  _ calm _ that washes over him like cooling waves of water ( and he believes just as he had in Gothenburg, that everything will be just fine ).

He clings when Victor wraps his arms around him, soaking up this feeling like a sponge; never wanting to let go.

“I’m so happy you’re back,” he whispers.

“ _ Alltid,  _ Ras.”  _ Always _ .

Ras smiles and hides his face in the crook of Victor’s shoulder. He feels eyes on him but when he pulls away and turns, no one’s looking. There’s just Casey digging for something in his stall.

\--

He drags Victor home with them; after months, how could he not?

Some playlist plays in the background as he and Victor catch up quietly in Swedish. Casey is uncharacteristically silent in the backseat, not even offering a weak chirp about speaking in a language he can understand.

Ras pays it no mind, cutting the engine when they arrive and pulling Victor by the hand after him into their apartment.

Victor steps inside, eyes sweeping over the multitude of plants seemingly on every surface, pausing on his blue morning glories, lingering on the tulips at the center of the kitchen counter.

Ras feels his gaze return to him and doesn’t meet his eyes; Victor knows, of course he does.

Victor pulls his hand out of his grip. “I think I better go.”

“No---” he replies too quickly, too eager, too desperate having only just gotten him back.  _ Old habits die hard _ . “Stay the night. We have a guest room,” he pleads. No matter if both of them know Victor won’t be using the guest room if he says yes. “Vic ----  _ snälla.” Please. _

Something in Victor’s blue eyes softens. “Okay.”

\--

When Ras walks into the kitchen the next morning, the tulips on the counter are wilted worse than he’s ever seen them, yellow heads bowed toward the counter not unlike Casey’s is right now ( well,  _ exactly _ like his actually – it’s not surprising ).

He says nothing though and heads toward the fridge. He returns with eggs, milk, and bananas, fixing a gaze on a silent Casey. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong.”

Ras frowns, gaze shifting to the weary looking tulips; the plants never lie. He peels a banana.

“Where’s Victor?” Casey asks, but his tone –mildly accusing—sounds like he would rather not know.

Ras remains quiet for a beat too long. Victor is still asleep on Ras’ bed exactly where he left him when he woke up this morning, but he’s certain that Casey already knows that. Still, it’s not what he thinks. It’s just --- it’s just ---

Ras mashes a banana more harshly than necessary. “Still must be sleeping,” he says.

“Right.”

“Right,” mutters Ras, feeling very uncomfortable. The silence that follows is only broken by the hiss of the coffee maker.

Victor walks into the terse silence not too long after, oozing calm, hair still sleep mused and wearing a Frölunda sweatshirt. It’s adorned with Victor’s old number but hasn’t been his for over a year now. “I thought I lost this,” Victor comments off-handedly.

“I thought that was  _ your _ sweatshirt,” says Casey, and he’s looking at Ras, something edged in his voice.

Ras flushes pink slightly as he turns away. Casey leaves the kitchen without another word.

When Ras finally turns around again, Victor has settled into one of the counter’s stools looking at the wilting tulips before shifting to fix him with a knowing look. “Talk to him.”

“I know. I just ---- " Ras makes a helpless sort of noise and furiously returns to the banana pancakes cooking on the stovetop.

“ _ Ras ---- " _

“I don’t know what to say, Vic,” he whispers.

“Oh Ras,” says Victor softly. He lifts one of the drooping tulips heads with a finger and sighs. “You know what he thinks --- don’t let him think it.” Ras says nothing, but he knows he’s right. He pokes a spatula at the edge of the pancake. Victor shifts out of the stool when sizzling butter is the only answer he gets. “Well, I have to go.”

Ras’ head snaps up. “No! At least, stay for breakfast.”

Victor circles the counter and pulls him into a hug; Ras stumbles into it too easily. “Sorry,” he says, “but I promised I’d meet Lawrence.”

“I can’t do this.”

“Yes,” says Victor simply, “you can.”

Ras quietly clings back, closing his eyes to let the  _ calm _ wash over him.

\--

“Casey,” says Ras quietly when several hours later, he’s finally gathered the courage and can no longer take the silent treatment. “It’s not----”

_ It’s not what you think _ .

Ras doesn’t know how to explain it to someone who has never experienced it. How the long, long nights creep up and around you like a black tide and can disorient to the point of madness if you don’t have something to hold tight to.

There’ve been plenty of friends and teammates in Ras’ life, but the safest he’s ever felt outside of being home is falling asleep against Victor.

“We’re not --- he’s  _ home _ . It’s not what you  _ think _ .”

“And what am I supposed to think when you say that? He was in your  _ bed _ , Ras.”

“We were  _ sleeping _ .”

“I  _ saw _ you this morning.”

“It was just  _ sleeping _ .”

It’s easy to forget sometimes; Ras is still rather new to North America – he forgets the culture, the stigmas, the physical definition of friendship.

Still, he can’t lie completely;  _ shouldn’t _ lie completely. There was a time when he loved Victor as more than a friend; times when he still does.

Casey rolls his eyes in response and turns to go, and Ras can’t lose him too. He has to try; love is about  _ trying _ .

“Do you know how dark it gets at home?” he blurts quietly and his voice trembles. Casey stops halfway to the door. “When the long nights come and the sun only rises for a few hours? it’s so dark and cold and --- and it gets so  _ lonely. _ ” They’re desperate words; true words. “And it’s always been ---- it’s always been worse for me.”

His mother always said it was because he was too connected to his plants, gave part of himself away a long time ago and needed the light just as they did. And while Victor may not have been sunlight on the darkest day, he was calm, he was hope, he was the belief in the heart of dark nights that the sun will rise again --- and sometimes that’s what you need the most.

“He helped me. I can’t ever forget that.”

“No,” says Casey, but he sounds more resigned than anything. “I suppose not. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ----- get in the middle of it.” He chews out the last words like it pains him and Ras frowns.

“But  _ Casey _ \--- he hasn’t been here. He  _ wasn’t _ here for most of the season---”

“I  _ know _ . You miss him. I get it. I said I’d stay out of---”

“That’s not ---” Ras tries to collect his scattered thoughts, “That’s not what I’m saying.”

“That  _ what _ \---”

“I’m---” Ras makes a frustrated noise, words swimming between Swedish and English in his head. “I’m --- I’m saying he wasn’t here but it was all right because you  _ were _ .”

“Me?” Casey blinks, seemingly shocked into a brief silence. “What have I ever done for you?”

“Don’t be daft. Can’t you see?”

Casey huffs out an exasperated laugh, “See  _ what _ , Rasmus? That I wasn’t enough?”

It’s Ras’ turn to be speechless for a moment, and in his head it’s every pressed memory playing: every time Casey’s been there for him this season, every joke to make him laugh, every movie night and late night grocery run to get their minds off hockey. They weren’t replaced moments, no substitution for something lost; they were something new, something to chase---

“Casey --- that’s not --- I’m --- I ---”

Ras stumbles over his words, lapsing briefly into a string of barely muttered Swedish as Casey rolls his eyes. But he comes to a conclusion rather quickly, reaching out and grabbing Casey’s shirt to haul him in, awkwardly smashing their lips together.

It’s not quite how he saw this going, but Casey is warm under his hands, relaxing into his grip after the shock of the moment. And---

\--- kissing Casey is like kissing the sun: hot, golden, and invigorating.

Against his lips, Casey smiles.

On the counter, the tulips blossom a new flower.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this piece.
> 
> The idea for this originally sparked from an old tumblr post I saw a while ago about someone’s friend who kept flowers and named them after their friends and whenever one wilted or began to die, they would go talk to them and almost always find them going through a tough time and help them. I thought that was really sweet and fit a magical realism trope really well, as you can’t really tell if that’s merely coincidence or if there’s some magic to it.
> 
> I apologize for getting a little sidetracked with the Ras and Vic business, but it’s something I’ve really loved exploring as of late and you can expect more about that to come soon :)
> 
> Lastly, if you want to chat I’m over [here](http://eichhart.tumblr.com) as always!
> 
> \---
> 
> Ras’ flowers and their meanings:
> 
> Casey— Yellow tulips: sunshine in your smile  
> Father—Daffodils: regard  
> Ella—Violet: loyalty  
> Victor—Morning glory: affection  
> Sam and Jack—Mint: virtue  
> Tage-- Sage: wisdom (and a play on a name)  
> Felix—Ivy: friendship


End file.
